The HistoryMakers
The History Makers
The HistoryMakers is
a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit research and educational institution dedicated to preserving and providing access to the stories of prominent and lesser-known African Americans
. It is the largest collection of first-person video oral histories of African Americans in the world, serving as a vital historical resource.
The HistoryMakers digital archive
A unique historical record: The organization documents the life stories of thousands of African Americans across 15 distinct categories, including the arts, business, civics, education, entertainment, law, and STEM. The collection of interviews, totaling over 10,000 hours of testimony, is housed at the Library of Congress.
Addressing overlooked history: The project was founded to address the lack of documentation of African American life since the WPA Slave Narratives of the 1930s. It aims to capture “America’s Missing Stories” and create a more inclusive record of American history.
Notable figures included: The archive includes interviews with a “who’s who” of the African American community, such as:
Katherine Johnson, the NASA mathematician featured in Hidden Figures.
Vernon Jordan, a civil rights activist.
Angela Davis, the political activist and scholar, Harry Belafonte, the singer and activist, Barack Obama, interviewed while he was an Illinois State Senator. Arts and Entertainment, Maya Angelou: The iconic poet and author shared her philosophy on being a voice for everyone, Quincy Jones: The legendary music producer, composer, and record label executive.Berry Gordy: The founder of Motown Records, James Earl Jones: The renowned actor, Whoopi Goldberg: The acclaimed actress, comedian, and television host, Oprah Winfrey: The media entrepreneur and television host, Gwen Ifill: The prolific journalist and co-managing editor of PBS NewsHour, Richard Roundtree: The actor known for his starring role in the film Shaft,
Josephine Baker: The singer, dancer, and fashion icon.
Access for Education: The HistoryMakers Digital Archive serves as an educational tool for libraries and universities. It allows researchers, students, and the public to access high-quality video content and fully searchable transcripts of the interviews.
https://www.thehistorymakers.org
MS. JULIEANNA RICHARDSON
FOUNDER – The HistoryMakers
Julieanna L. Richardson has a diverse background in theatre, television production, and the cable television industry that created a unique path to founding the largest effort to record the African American experience since the WPA Slave Narratives of the 1930s. Founded in 2000, The HistoryMakers is a national, 501(c)(3) non-profit educational institution headquartered in Chicago committed to preserving, developing and providing easy access to an internationally recognized, archival collection of thousands of African American video oral histories.
A 1980 graduate of Harvard Law School, Richardson graduated from Brandeis University with a double-major in Theatre Arts and American Studies, where she did extensive oral history interviews on the Harlem Renaissance and Langston Hughes. She worked as a corporate lawyer at the Chicago law firm of Jenner & Block prior to serving in the early 1980s as the Cable Administrator for the City of Chicago Office of Cable Communications.
Richardson currently sits on the Honors Council of Lawyers for the Creative Arts; Simmons University Dean’s Advisory Council of the Gwen Ifill College of Media, Arts, and Humanities, and James Madison University’s Flowerings Advisory Council. She has been awarded Honorary Doctorates from Howard University (2012), Dominican University (2014) and Brandeis University (2016). She has also served as the commencement speaker for Dominican University as well as Brandeis University 65th commencement. In 2014, Black Enterprise magazine awarded Richardson its 2014 Legacy Award, its highest recognition of women’s achievement. That same year, Richardson was profiled in American Masters: The Boomer List, a PBS documentary and exhibition at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. She is a 2021 recipient of the Chicago History Museum’s John Hope Franklin Making History Award, which celebrates prominent Chicagoans who have made the city a better place to live. Published in July 2022, her TedTalk “The Mission to Safeguard Black History in the U.S.” is viewable on YouTube.
